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Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

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341–350 of 354 posts

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#341

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Fairly certain he’s referring to Dodge v. Ford Motor Company, where it was established that a company needs to operate in the best interests of shareholders above all else. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dodge_v._Ford_Motor_Co.?wprov=...

Also IIRC there was a case before the Supreme Court where the dispute was whether shareholder value was the sole & supreme goal, or there could be other factors involved from other stakeholders (such as workers, the community, ...). The Supremes ruled for shareholder value. However I forget details of ths case. If anyone here happens to know what case I am referring to, please chime in.

I don't know of a case where the Court affirmed shareholder primacy - as far as I am aware it's a state by state thing though since Delaware has it in their code it impacts a massive number of corporations.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#342

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The list of orders and deliveries is public: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Boeing_737_MAX_orders_... Most orders were before the accidents but the vast majority haven't been canceled. Boeing has only delivered a fraction of them; they have another 3,000 to deliver before they get to the orders placed after the accidents (~1400).

> but the vast majority haven't been canceled. What a load of bull. Just last week the Seattle times was mentioning that the MAX had had 1200 orders cancelled. And here is a Reuters article citing 480+ MAX orders cancelled, just for the first 9 months of 2020. https://www.reuters.com/article/idUSKBN26Y2AD/

80% of the orders haven't been cancelled.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#343
post #291

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I think would not be exactly political. The part where the plutocracy benefits the interests of a few pockets would certainly be political, but by other part, the major aircraft manufacturers in the EU and the UE, build civil aircraft as well as military ones. As I understand it, to torpedo these companies by dumping prices would be to indirectly torpedo the EU's and the UE's defense aircraft production. A cost based…

Why do you assume out of hand they would be low quality? We see in other industries, such as the Chinese military industry, that they are capable of producing a lot of high quality air frames. Their stealth J-20 has never had an accident in the 13 years it's been flying and they are building 120 per year, and flying them tens of thousands of hours per year. You can look at other models. Their Xian Y-20 freighter has…

  Why do you assume out of hand they would be low quality?
The short answer? Peers and past performance as a predictor of the future. Transport aircraft are way more complex and held to higher standards than military aircraft. Or look at where the SSJ100, SpaceJet, ARJ-21 and C919 are today. COMAC's delivered four C919s in three years and has yet to get EASA or FAA certification. Most of the C919 orders are from big Chinese banks or leasing companies with no clear interest from airlines (domestic or foreign).

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#344
post #311

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The military ones are Russian engineering assisted, iirc. The ones we should look at for airlines would be the Comac C919 ( and progressively C929 and C939). https://theaircurrent.com/china/china-eastern-comac-c919-ret... > Launch airline China Eastern’s tentative February 28 entry-into-service date never materialized [..] > After regularly operating as part of its route proving, the aircraft appeared to change tempo…

The J-20 and Y-20 have absolutely zero russian input.

Aside from the engines.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#347

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Save for perhaps the development of transporter technology or an unending deluge of viral pandemics, making airplanes for commercial aviation seems fairly predictable as to whether or not it'll exist in 25 years.

To some extent, but your airplane customer has quite a bit more flexibility than a grocery customer. I'm probably not going to buy French perishables but an airbus is a different story.

The decision to value the long term trust of your employees, customers and business partners more than short term profits would apply to any type of business that wants to survive and thrive over the long haul.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#348

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sometime in 2023 Alaska Airlines completed their efforts to sell off all their Airbus and Bombardier Q400 aircraft. Alaska acquired Virgin America and its all-Airbus fleet in 2016, and the Q400s were from their Horizon Air operations. The company sold the Airbus aircraft to American and retired the Bombardiers. The reason given at the time was the desire to simplify maintenance and parts logistics. Now Alaska's fleet…

I flew on an Alaska branded Embraer craft a few days ago. Do you mean only those operated directly by Alaska? I think mine was operated by Sky West.

Yeah, Alaska operating as Sky West. It's kind of like outsourcing.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#349
post #288
post #281

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The failure of the A380 still surprises me. Wasn't the 747 super successful? What's wrong with the A380? All of a sudden, now that Airbus has the biggest plane, big planes aren't good anymore?

I think it was a combination of cost, incompatibility (it typically required airports to fix their runways to accommodate it), and the above-mentioned fact that Airbus' core European market had largely moved towards low-cost PtP. The A380 makes sense only for hub-and-spoke, and/or flights over 4-5h. COVID was the nail in the coffin.

Airports also had to raise a new lounge/gate floor, and buy new ~double height jetbridges to access the upper deck of the A380.

Re: Did a 1997 merger ruin Boeing?

#350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> If there's [...] no market cnstraints its obvious that the product is going to be really good and really expensive. Well sure, you literally just removed the cost optimization variable. SpaceX vs. NASA is a clear example demonstrating that engineers can do this sort of optimization when it's given to them as a constraint. NASA's rocket designs were all custom, single-use, often down to the bolts because the budget…

Spacex also had the very small advantage of all the basic science being done for them for free. The constraint in the NASA golden years wasn't getting it done cheaply, it was getting it done at all.

Rockets haven't changed much since the 60s. This doesn't explain all of the launches since the Space Shuttle, for example. Furthermore, SpaceX clearly innovated with their reusable rockets, but this is exactly the kind of cost constraint that commercial ventures prioritize which government ventures often don't.
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